[Guardian PvP] Playing Guardian in Rated Battlegrounds Guide S12+

You will be in Feral DPS spec while tanking in this current patch. This is due to blizzard implementing changes which gives tank specs an extra 50% damage taken while holding a flag in flag carriying maps.
Due to this, some parts of the guide (mastery increasing armor, for example) will not count in feral spec. I will still keep these in the guide in case blizzard decides to revert this change.

Racials are a strong reason for choosing a race if you don't mind the aesthetics, especially in PvP. I will list all the Druid races for both factions and a summary of how their racials benefits us and I will list them in order (starting with most useful)

Worgen: Darkflight Probably one of the best Guardian races because of the extra speed which also stacks with the speed pickup. It is a relatively fair cooldown, because it has a decent amount of speed boost with a good duration and low CD. The ideal choice if you play Alliance.

Tauren: -War Stomp--Endurance- War stomp is very useful for a tank. It is an aoe stun, although it is a short duration, it can be enough time to get that wild charge leap out of there or that cyclone cast. Those 2 seconds can prove to be vital when you are on low hp and can mean the difference between getting healed or dying. The extra base hp isn't much (around 5k hp increase) but it always helps to have more HP. For me this is the best horde race for playing Guardian in PvP.

Night Elf: -Shadowmeld--Quickness- Unfortunately meld can't be used whilst carrying a flag, but it can be used when base defending to interrupt casts and get a restealth/reopen. The extra dodge will also help slightly with tanking, so overall they are not "bad" racials, but definitely the second choice when choosing an Alliance character.

Troll:-Berserking--Regeneration--Da Voodoo Shuffle- I listed Troll at the bottom because firstly, the reduction of movement impairing effects doesn't matter for Druids because we are able to powershift out of them. Secondly, the in-combat regeneration is barely noticable (about 400-500 each time it ticks) and Berserking is more of a DPS cooldown than a tanking cooldown.

Talents and Glyphs:

Now for FC PvP talents, there are some which provide a lot of utility and in my opinion Druids have the best talents for kiting out of all the tanking classes. I will say here which talent I chose and why, and why it is better than other options in the same tier.

Tier 1: Wild Charge- I chose this because it has many different uses and they all provide great mobility. Some ways of using it to get on top of your graveyard (if you are just turtling for the last 2 minutes of the game) kiting off the roof in your base (jumping down then jumping back up to someone on top after enemies jump down) and leaping to someone ahead of you for extra distance. The reason I chose this over the other 2 talents is because Feral Swiftness won't make a difference to speed anymore because speed is now capped at 200%, and at 4 stacks of flag debuff you are capped at 100%. Displacer beast cannot be used with the flag so there isn't really much point there.

Tier 2: Renewal- This is the most useful talent in the tier because when it used with Might of Ursoc and Battlemaster trinket, you get a heal of around 330-350k when you are fully geared. It DOES have a longer cooldown than natures swiftness, but it should be noted you shouldn't actually need to be in the situation where you are low hp every 2 minutes. Cenarion ward is no where near enough healing to survive as a tank. Nature's swiftness provides low a heal but it can be used to get off instant CC so it still can be useful, but I would say a 300k+ heal puts it above both other choices.

Tier 3: Typhoon- Typhoon is a great cooldown for tanking. You can use it on the roof of your base to knock enemies off and base-defending in Arathi Basin. Can be used to also slow enemies behind you because as well as having a knockback it also dazes them for a few seconds. I took this over Mass Entanglement because 2 minutes CD for a root seems a bit of a one-sided choice to me when typhoon has 30 seconds. Faerie Swarm is only single-target so I disregard that.

Tier 4:Force of Nature- I changed this one in 5.3 because force of nature in feral spec stuns your target. It has 3 charges, with a 20sec recharge. It is very useful for base defence and kiting as an EFC. I found it useful to peel rogues off me if they are waiting in the enemy flag room.

Tier 5: Ursol's Vortex This is a good ability because it has a short CD and is a good AOE slow. I chose this over Demoralizing Roar because it's only a very short disorient, compared to a large duration slow and it can be used a lot more effectively. And I took it over Mighty Bash because that's only single-target.

Tier 6: Heart of the Wild- This one is an obvious choice. It has a long duration and a slight passive stat increase. It increases self-healing massively, no mana cost, and increases your stats in bear form. This is useful since you are tanking in feral spec, and the self healing increase helps out when you can get rejuves off while kiting. It does have a long cooldown so just try to perserve it for higher stacks or if you are definitely in bad trouble. Dream of Cenarius isn't really useful for a tank due to the fact you don't get any Predatory Swiftness procs in bear form for the heals and you won't have enough time to make use of it even if you could.

Prime Glyphs:

1. Glyph of Might of Ursoc- This makes Might of Ursoc a much stronger cooldown and works well with Renewal (more health = more heal) it does increase the cooldown by 2 minutes, in which my opinion is worth it. You shouldn't need to activate a strong cooldown like this every 3 minutes so i think it's a small price to increase the cooldown by 2 minutes.

2. Glyph of Barkskin- A good glyph that makes you 25% less able to be crit while Barkskin is up. Defintiely a must have glyph. 25% is a big reduction and Barkskin is only on a 1 minute cooldown.

3. Glyph of Prowl- Useful glyph for flag carrying. With this you can stealth early to get past the enemy team and not lose any speed in case your team is going to attempt a speed cap.

Minor Glyphs:

These are mainly player preference because they are mainly cosmetic, but one I'd say that is worth taking is Glyph of Aquatic Form as it can be used in Twin Peaks if you take the water way that leads out of the horde base.

Stats

Stats for tanking as a Guardian in PvP will be important when optimising your surviability. Statting will all revolve around stats that boost your surviability. Crit for procs and other things that are statted in PvE are not useful when you are kiting. Your main stat will be Stamina. I will explain this later in the "Gemming" section. Resilience is no longer worth anything anymore. It scales a lot worse than it did previously and the gems were halfed. Having full resi gems and enchants gave me a worthless 1.7% increase in resilience. Thirdly, Mastery is going to be another stat of importance. This grants extra armor rating for Guardian Druids and is getting a buff in the upcoming patch.

PvE Gear:

In patch 5.3, there is an advantage to using some PvE items in PvP as a tank. Resilience has been removed from current PvP gear, so it doesn't provide much of a bonus to us. These are all below the 496 ilevel so they don't get scaled down in rated areas. Here are some items I have found that are good to use.

With these two items above, go for the 2 set bonus. This reduces the cooldown on might of ursoc by 60 seconds. Being a defensive CD, this is a good set bonus to have. The shoulders also have a 90 stamina socket bonus.

The most effective way to gem this season for FC'ing is to go all out on stamina gems.

As you probably know, in 5.3 resilience has been removed from gear as well halfing the gems. Having full resilience gems and enchants gave me a 1.7% increase in resilience, which is around 10% damage reduction. Stamina scales well with our abilities such as Might of Ursoc and Renewal so I'm taking stamina over resilience because of that this patch.

This is why stamina gems are the only other option to us. Dodge, parry etc are useless in PvP, being negated by being behind a target etc, so it's not worth gemming.

Reforging in 5.3 will be a lot different this season. Mastery is no longer beneficial to a tank so it is going to be centered around reforging into dodge.

Dodge doesn't serve as a good defensive stat in PvP, but at the moment, it is our only option in terms of a reforge-able defensive stat.

Every item that has haste should be reforged into Dodge. I have not had time to practice how useful dodge is in PvP, but it is mitigated by people being behind you.

Mastery rating should also be reforged into Dodge.

Ability Usage:

Making full use of your abilities is key to surviving for as long as possible in a long match. Your rage priority is going to be used on Frenzied Regeneration. Savage Defense will be used if you are gaining a lot of rage when forced into melee but frenzied regeneration is going to be the best use of rage cost. Knowing abilities such as Nature's Grasp can be used to get that 1 annoying rogue of you or that 1 warrior which help A LOT against melee-orientated teams. Using Ursol's Vortex you chose in the talents earlier you can block access to yourself. For example the tunnels in Warsong Gulch can be blocked off with a vortex if you are running back to your base by placing the vortex in the entrance. Wild Charge can be implemented many ways which are situational and is very useful if used correctly, like jumping to your graveyard or up to your base's roof. Typhoon can also be used in a few ways, such as a knockback off your roof, knockback when defending Lumber Mill, knocking people out of rings in Silvershard Mines and slowing a mass of people behind you with the daze.

Survival Usage:

Using your survival cooldowns at the wrong time can be disastrous on the match. If you use them when you didn't really need them, you may find later if you didn't use them you could of otherwise survived a situation in which you died. Your main survival cooldowns include: Survival Instincts, Barkskin, Might of Ursoc, Heart of the Wild, Renewal, and both trinkets. Like mentioned earlier, Renewal used with Might of Ursoc and your Battlemaster trinket grants a huge heal (around 330-350k) and is extremely useful in dire situations, which is why we chose the Might of Ursoc glyph. Barkskin can be used quite frequently as it only has a 1 minute cooldown. The best way to use it is to use the advantage of it being able to be used while stunned / frozen etc. For example instead of trinketing a stun or deep freeze you don't need to, you can use Barkskin instead. Survival Instincts is also another cooldown to be saved.

Congratulations, this is the end of the guide. I hope this guide helped you as it took me a while to do while I was bored and if you notice anything wrong please post below along with any questions you have. Thank you for reading.

For Tier 1, without Feline Swiftness you don't get 200% on Travel form, you get 175% (considering the set bonus already). Isn't it worth picking it to get a 200% travel form which you can shift instantly and in combat and then no one will reach you even mounted (except palas and dks, who mount faster than 200%, but then you Dash to run faster than them mounted)? Or the defensive mobility and the charge immobilizing 4sec with 15s cooldown will always be a best choice?

What do you think about leaving bear form when rage is 0, casting rejuv, shifting back to bear with 10 rage and insta Frenzied Regeneration?
Too much risk in shifting out of bear for only gaining little heal (as non-Heart of Wild rejuv ticks heal approx. half of when cooldown is up and Frenzied with 10 rage is about 9k heal) or is it worth keep doing it when u have a small room just enough to shift in and out?

Also related to shift in and out, what do you think about Soothing the Warrs and the Ferals (when no Druid friend is near)?

To be more general, what are your thoughts on every shapeshift out of Bear? Too dangerous and should be avoided by any cost?
Shift out to cat(or travel outdoors) for kite when Stampede Roar for extra speed or keep on Bear and just shift out while Dashing?

"For Tier 1, without Feline Swiftness you don't get 200% on Travel form, you get 175% (considering the set bonus already). Isn't it worth picking it to get a 200% travel form which you can shift instantly and in combat and then no one will reach you even mounted (except palas and dks, who mount faster than 200%, but then you Dash to run faster than them mounted)? Or the defensive mobility and the charge immobilizing 4sec with 15s cooldown will always be a best choice?"

I've said most of this in the guide but I'll just highlight some of it: Feline Swiftness does not matter 4 stacks of flag carrying debuff. Neither dash or stampeding roar. You are capped at 100% movement speed and CANNOT go over it with ANYTHING. Without debuffs you cannot go over 200% movement speed anymore. This was hotfixed as you was able to get over 300% speed. So I take wild charge because the leap is unaffected by buffs and it can be used in a variety ways.

What do you think about leaving bear form when rage is 0, casting rejuv, shifting back to bear with 10 rage and insta Frenzied Regeneration?
Too much risk in shifting out of bear for only gaining little heal (as non-Heart of Wild rejuv ticks heal approx. half of when cooldown is up and Frenzied with 10 rage is about 9k heal) or is it worth keep doing it when u have a small room just enough to shift in and out?

It's not worth doing because if you get stunned when you shift out there is a chance you can get stunned (you can do it if no one is near I guess) out of form and then pretty much its GG

Also related to shift in and out, what do you think about Soothing the Warrs and the Ferals (when no Druid friend is near)?

You can do this depending on how many people are near you how much trouble you are in and how far away you are. If they are on you with 5 other people don't do it. If it's just 1 or 2 of them total then by all means do it.

To be more general, what are your thoughts on every shapeshift out of Bear? Too dangerous and should be avoided by any cost?
Shift out to cat(or travel outdoors) for kite when Stampede Roar for extra speed or keep on Bear and just shift out while Dashing?

As I said before none of those other forms will matter on 4+ stacks as you are capped at 100% movement so just stay bear.

Crass, im 100% certain that in last weeks RBG, I was easily hitting over 200% movement speed- 215% exact in Travel Form (Movement meta+movement boots+swiftness+4p), and Dash would allow me to run at 268% movement speed exact. First time with various different groups generally resulted in them asking me whether I was using a speed hack. So, unless this hotfix was applied extremely recently, Feline Swiftness is a good talent for the sole purpose of carrying the flag from the enemies base to your base (You can generally have the flag in your base by the time the enemy just got out the tunnel/bridge). Of course, with next patch, 4p no longer stacking with FS makes it a useless talent, with Displacer Beast taking its place as the "speed" talent. Do agree that WC is best t15 talent for mobility while holding a flag.

For the gem in the head, I would suggest a Expertise/Resil rather then Agi/Resil. Being able to hit a melee training you with Mangle for the slow, or hit the Warrior that just poped all CDs with a Bear Hug is, imo, more important then a slightly higher amount of AP, Dodge, and Crit.

So, yea, don't overlook Expertise as a FC. While mastery does reduce melee damage on you, the only 2 classes that deal close to 100% pure melee damage is the WW monk and Warriors, with all other melee dealing a combo of about 50/50 melee/magic damage, whereas ALL melee have quite a bit of either baseline parry, or baseline dodge. On the subject of Dodge, I would say that dodge could be rated even higher then Mastery as it allows you the chance to dodge certain hard-hitting attacks, providing you aren't stunned, or they are on your backside the whole time. Heck, its possible to even dodge a Kidney Shot.

Last edited by Raugnaut; 2013-02-03 at 08:47 PM.

Anyone ever notice how the sun seems to shine silverish now? Didn't it used to shine goldish? PM me if you've noticed this.

I would say that dodge could be rated even higher then Mastery as it allows you the chance to dodge certain hard-hitting attacks, providing you aren't stunned, or they are on your backside the whole time. Heck, its possible to even dodge a Kidney Shot.

The DR on Dodge Rating is so savage that it'd be hard to justify. Especially in later seasons.

The DR on Dodge Rating is so savage that it'd be hard to justify. Especially in later seasons.

While it would be hard to justify for PvE, where mitigating predictable damage is key, for PvP, for strong defensive, you either go Mastery, which only reduces damage taken, and for a number of classes, can be reduced through buffs/debuffs, or you can go dodge, which, while it doesn't do anything for you if stunned, can prevent melee hard-hitters from hitting you. For defensive use only, druid secondaries are pretty meh. Monks ignore 30% of armor, although the majority of thier damage will come from physical hits, warrios have Collosal Smash which ignores 50% of armor, and Dragon's Roar which ignores armor completly (And dps warriors will most likely run with this for its burst), Rogues, DKs, Paladins have half thier damage as magical, with sub rogues ignoring 70% of armor, and feral's damage comes mostly in the forms of bleeds, which also ignore armor. Enhancement is also in the magical-damage group. Non-MM hunters do quite a bit of non-magical damage- Survival's only physical damage is Auto-Shots, while BM has a greater amount of damage linked to the pet, which does count as armor. Smart MM hunter's use Arcane Shot in lieu of Aimed Shot on high-armor targets, thus causing their damage to be mostly either auto-attack or pet damage.

For defensive purposes, both have thier place- Dodge will allow you to potentially dodge all these attacks that Mastery isn't 100% effective against (All hunter shots, for instance, can be dodged, and Rogues don't do as much nature damage if thier hits are dodged. Warriors CS can also be dodged. Finally, a small number of stuns are on the melee table, and are affected by a chance to dodge).

With this being said, for defensive, Crit becomes viable due to higher SD uptime. When up against melee, if you are pretty good about keeping your front to em, you could potentially dodge ALL the stuns/burst abilities, thus reducing the chance of you dieing in a burst. Either way, all the stats has its pros/cons. Mastery, while it reduces the MELEE damage you take, is mitigated largely by the fact that a huge amount of damage from most classes ignores a % of armor, thus reducing its effectiveness by anywhere from 30% (The lowest, Monks), to a good 80% (Survival Hunters), not to mention the fact that it takes a TON of mastery rating to get even 2% damage reduced by armor through it. Sure, unlike Dodge, it'll become better and better as baseline armor increases, whereas the value of dodge relative to other stacks declines as you acquire more of it.

This really only applies to reforging, however. For Gemming, if its yellow, you gem Resil. If its blue, bonus>160 resil, you gem stam/resil. If its red, bonus>160 resil, well, I personally suggest expertise/resil, since having an important move dodged can make things go downhill. For enchanting, there really isn't much choice in most of the things, Resil>Stamina.

In short, though, Mastery, while it DOES reduce physical damage taken, has a very high stat budget compared to crit, dodge, and ALL phyiscal dps ignores a certain portion of armor, further reducing the overall value of mastery compared to other stats. Dodge, while RNG, can allow you to dodge attacks that mastery wouldn't reduce, but also dodge certain key stuns. Crit, while its more of an offensive stat, and offense is the last resort for FC once you can no longer run, increases your rage generation so that you could either, A) apply more offensive pressure, possibly killing a dps before he can kill you, B) apply Savage Defense, possibly causing the dps's burst to fail, or C) use Frenzied Regeneration, either unglyphed for the pure healing, or glyphed so that your healer could heal you better.

Also, one thing to add for ppl reading this that isn't covered. For a FC, there is an order of importance in the ability to do things- Mobilty, Control, Burst survivability, Sustained Survivabilty. Mobilty, the most important, allows you to stay out of the reach of damage dealers. If they can't touch you, they can't kill you. Control is if they reach you- the ability to shut down a damage dealer allows you to stay alive long enough to cap a flag. Burst survivability is once you have been chased down, and you have used all control- its the ability to survive about a 10-15 second window in which the dps are hammering you to their full capability. Sustained Survivability is where the dps used all thier burst, and now they are trying to wear you and the healer down. In this, it becomes a kill them before they kill you type thing, where the amount of offensive stats you have becomes crucial.

For druids, our first strength is our long-distance mobility. A druid's travel form can reach a maximum of 215% speed, a druid dashing averages around 225% speed. You can sacrifice some long-distance mobility for some good short-distance mobility in the form of Wild Charge. After that comes control - Typhoon is excellent for knocking damage dealers off roofs/platforms, giving you anywhere from 15-30 seconds of breathing space. The T75 talents are pretty useful, wth Disorienting Roar throwing off the tempo of a group of damage dealers converging on you. Finally, a good Guardian can use his 3 cast-time CCs for controlling- Cyclone a bursting warlock, rooting a melee, or sleeping a BM's pet. After that, for burst-survivability, we have a few very good spells- Might of Ursoc, granting you 50% extra health, and healing you to 50%, and should be used when dropping below 30%, Renewal, which, as stated, can be a 300k+ heal, and should be used during Might of Ursoc, Survival Insticts, 50% damage reduction, which should be used whenever you see some dps pop thier bursting CDs, and glyphed Barkskin, which should be used as soon as you are stunned.

For sustained survivability, its essentially using basic bear rotation, while trying to keep up control.

Anyone ever notice how the sun seems to shine silverish now? Didn't it used to shine goldish? PM me if you've noticed this.

True, which is one o the reasons why I said FS is only useful if all you care about is getting the flag to your base asap (which can work with some groups that turtle heavily while relying on the guardian FC to end the match quick)

Second was a bit of recapping, but also adding the usefulness of dodge and crit compared to mastery, whereas you just said "go mastery" for the armor, which has varying usefulness in PvP, some pros, some cons, compared to both crit, and dodge, both of which have pros/cons.

Anyone ever notice how the sun seems to shine silverish now? Didn't it used to shine goldish? PM me if you've noticed this.

One thing I discovered is the slowing debuff from carrying the flag (after 4 stacks) does not apply to swim form. I had 8 stacks and was still able to go at full swim form speed. This helps a lot in Twin Peaks when hiding out underwater while the team takes down EFC.

How do you deal with offspec gear progression through the season?
I mean, for Temple of Kotmogu and Silvershard Mines

You play them as Guardian? You go Feral?
For those who go with a dps offspec
What's better? Go Feral with Guardian Conquest gear, gemmed/enchanted/reforged to tank stats, or go Feral with a Honor Set (except Weapon obviously) gemmed/enchanted/reforged to DPS as Feral?
I mean, does agility and pvp power stacking in an honor gear becomes better than a conquest gear that I will stack resi and stam, becoming a feral with lot a stam/resi and less agi?